From: owner-persfin-digest@lists.xmission.com (persfin-digest) To: persfin-digest@lists.xmission.com Subject: persfin-digest V5 #112 Reply-To: persfin Sender: owner-persfin-digest@lists.xmission.com Errors-To: owner-persfin-digest@lists.xmission.com Precedence: bulk Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable X-No-Archive: yes persfin-digest Saturday, December 18 1999 Volume 05 : Number 112 In this issue of the Personal Finance Digest: Sell Mutual funds before or after distributions? Forgot "Hiding" capital gains Re: "Hiding" capital gains Anyone pay attention to dividends or P/E ratios? CREDIT CARS AND FREQUENT FLYER MILES. The messages posted to the Persfin-Digest are opinions and are not intended to substitute for qualified professional advice. Subscribers should seek the services of qualified professionals for such advice. The publisher, Internet provider, and Digest contributors cannot be held responsible for any loss incurred as a result of the application of any of the information provided here. To ask questions or provide answers, send your email to "persfin-digest@lists.xmission.com". Also, you can "reply" to the persfin-digest and your email tool should fill in the same address. However, if you "reply", be sure to edit the subject field in your email to reflect your topic. Copyright (c) 1999, Jeff Salisbury POSTED SUBSCRIPTION FEE: $20/year. Payment is optional. You will not be billed. The Digest is available to all subscribers, whether or not they pay. I do not discriminate either in favor of paying subscribers or against nonpaying subscribers. If you feel that the information presented here is worth the fee, and you feel comfortable paying it, send cash, check, or money order (U.S. funds), payable to "Jeff Salisbury", to: Jeff Salisbury 65 North 1300 East Logan, Utah 84321 Payment will be acknowledged by e-mail if you include an e-mail address. Subscribe: e-mail majordomo@xmission.com, text: subscribe persfin-digest Unsubscribe: e-mail majordomo@xmission.com, text: unsubscribe persfin-digest ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 17 Dec 99 10:22:55 EST From: juanb@vnet.ibm.com Subject: Sell Mutual funds before or after distributions? I've been invested in a mutual fund for about 3 years, making monthly contributions. The performance has been average at best so I decided to liquidate the account and invest in something else. They were scheduled to make distributions on 12/16, so I sold everything on 12/15, since they were going to make significant dividend and short-term capital gains distributions. When I called the company, they were very emphatic on stating that I would not receive the coming distributions, almost making it sound like I was going to lose out on a great windfall. My logic is that since I've held the fund for over a year, all my gains will be long-term (20%) and since when distributions are made, the NAV falls by that amount, the money I would have received after the sale may have been less, with the remainder being made up of the div/st-g, with all the money taxed accordingly. Should I have sold after the date, or is this a wash either way? Thanks, Juan - - ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 17 Dec 1999 09:24:57 -0800 From: "Steve R. Rasmussen" Subject: Forgot Jeff, I hit the send switch before I remembered to tell you that Persfin digests 109 and 110 did not come to me. The last Persfin digest I received before getting number 111 this morning is 108. Steve - - ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 17 Dec 1999 11:55:53 -0800 (PST) From: Brian Gordon Subject: "Hiding" capital gains I have a "happiness problem" -- humongous gains from ESO stock after IPO -- but I can't stand the idea of giving up 40% of it to taxes. A financial advisor has just suggested I bury it in Oil Exploration/Drilling, with an outfit that has a good track record, so that almost all of it it a tax deduction which is never recovered. Too good to be true? More complex than I understand? +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | Brian Gordon -->briang@netcom.com<-- Brian_Gordon@whitelight.com | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ - - ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 17 Dec 1999 15:43:30 -0700 From: Jeff Salisbury Subject: Re: "Hiding" capital gains Brian Gordon wrote: > > I have a "happiness problem" -- humongous gains from ESO stock after IPO -- but > I can't stand the idea of giving up 40% of it to taxes. A financial advisor > has just suggested I bury it in Oil Exploration/Drilling, with an outfit that > has a good track record, so that almost all of it it a tax deduction which is > never recovered. Too good to be true? More complex than I understand? > Brian, It isn't clear to me what your advisor is recommending -- Is he suggesting you sell some other holding you have that is a loser and offseting your gain with the loss? Or, is he suggesting that you buy a limited partnership so you can offset the gain you have with the operating losses of the limited partnership? Jeff - - ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 18 Dec 1999 09:17:01 -0500 From: Ira Krakow Subject: Anyone pay attention to dividends or P/E ratios? I was wondering if any persfiners take dividends into account when = considering investments. I know it's hard to take a 5% dividend = seriously in the era of VA Linux (IPO price of $11, first bid $299) or = Red Hat, but perhaps for someone nearing retirement a regular check that = is backed by a company with real earnings might make one sleep a bit = better at night. =20 Also, what about companies with solid earnings and a brand name. = Companies like Coca Cola and Gillette have hit some bumps recently but = neither of them will go away soon, unless we all stop drinking Coke and = shaving. What about *current* earnings? Ira __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Thousands of Stores. Millions of Products. All in one place. Yahoo! Shopping: http://shopping.yahoo.com - - ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 18 Dec 1999 12:08:41 -0500 From: BOB FORD Subject: CREDIT CARS AND FREQUENT FLYER MILES. I have also run into problems using credit cards on very large purchases. I try to use my credit card on every purchase no matter how small or large. These purchases soon add up to a lot for frequent flyer miles. BOB FORD - - ------------------------------ End of persfin-digest V5 #112 ***************************** - To unsubscribe to persfin-digest, send an email to "majordomo@xmission.com" with "unsubscribe persfin-digest" in the body of the message. For information on digests or retrieving files and old messages send "help" to the same address. Do not use quotes in your message.